Firearms Debate Series, Part II: Opponents cite sanity

Heartbroken that the 20 children killed in Newtown, Conn., won't have a chance to "grow old," Caroline Street Elementary School fifth-grader Katherine Cuneo reads a short statement in favor of gun control Jan. 12 in Saratoga Springs. (ED BURKE/eburke@saratogian.com)

Robyn Ringler, leader of the Capital District chapter of New Yorkers Against Gun Violence, joins gun control advocates Feb. 12 to show support for the state's SAFE Act at the Capitol in Albany. (Courtesy of the Times Union)

For this article, the second half of a two-day series on the firearms debate in New York state, The Saratogian spoke with three Saratoga County residents who support stronger gun control legislation. Here, they share their personal experiences with firearms and their perspectives on the state's controversial gun legislation, the NY SAFE Act.

Carol Maxwell

Carol Maxwell of Saratoga Springs is a former National Rifle Association member and "probably still a pretty good shot," but, she said, "Guns no longer have a place in my life."

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Growing up, Maxwell spent half of her childhood in Glenville and the other half in the Adirondacks, where her mother's family lived, so she grew up around guns. She learned to shoot as a teenager and went hunting periodically.

"I used to be dismissive of people who wanted gun control laws," Maxwell, 55, said. The people she knew were responsible gun owners who taught their children to respect guns. "It was a rite of passage."

However, as Maxwell's surroundings changed, so did her perspective.

She moved to bigger cities like Albany, Boston and San Francisco, and gun violence got closer. She said she moved from a community of responsible gun owners to just the opposite.

In the cities, "there are a lot of people who own guns who have no business owning guns," Maxwell said.

If her life had played out differently, she said, she might own a gun and be a gun rights advocate today.

But Maxwell has two children now, and while she said her children have gone shooting with her family members, ownership is "too risky if you have children in your home. There are lots of people who thought they had it covered and tragically did not."

She believes gun laws should be more sensible and enforced nationwide.

"They are incredibly inconsistent to the point that they become meaningless," she said. "The restrictions set up now are not well thought through."

If she designed the laws, Maxwell said they would require gun owners to prove their competence with the weapon. She likened it to passing driving tests before earning a driver's license.

"Why shouldn't someone who has a lethal weapon in their back pocket have to prove they know how to use it?" she asked.

A descendant of a Minuteman who was shot at the Battle of Lexington, Maxwell said, "I don't take any part of the Constitution lightly," but added that like other amendments, the Second Amendment should not be absolute. "You don't have the right to go into a theater and shout, 'Fire!' All of our rights come with responsibilities."

Even when she exercised her right to assemble with other members of Saratogians for Gun Safety to protest the Jan. 12 Saratoga Arms Fair at the Saratoga Springs City Center, they got a permit first.

"There is a focus on the right, and I think there needs to be a conversation about the responsibilities," Maxwell said.

-- By Lucian McCarty

Jay Ekman

There was a time when Jay Ekman, senior pastor at Presbyterian-New England Congregational Church in Saratoga Springs, asked during his sermons what magnitude of tragedy could strike the nation that would incite a sane approach to gun control.

He said he no longer asks that question, though, because he doesn't believe such an event will come to pass.

For Ekman, a sane approach to gun control starts with universal background checks and eliminating production and access to firearms with large-capacity magazines.

"Anything that reduces the availability is a little bit helpful," he said.

To make a point, Ekman compared the United States' approach to domestic gun violence to its national defense spending. On average, guns kill 3,700 children and teens in the United States each year, he said. However, the nation has poured its resources into fighting battles overseas, spending $3 trillion at war with Iraq and Afghanistan.

"We are doing comparatively nothing to stem the gun violence and deaths in our own country. If an outside enemy does it to us, we better do something, but if we do it to ourselves, it's OK," Ekman said. "Where I come from, dead is still dead."

He said the notion of arming oneself with weapons creates a false division between the "bad and good guys," an idea he calls "theologically bankrupt."

There was an armed guard at Columbine High School during the 1999 massacre, Ekman pointed out, and also with John F. Kennedy and Robert F. Kennedy when they were fatally shot.

The pastor doesn't take issue with hunting and even owns two shotguns himself, but he doesn't interpret the Second Amendment in the same way most firearm enthusiasts do.

"It is so clear the Second Amendment was there for a need for a well-regulated militia," Ekman said, adding that the Founding Fathers never envisioned large-capacity magazines that hold 100 bullets.

He also senses something is not entirely right with the way guns are glorified in American culture.

"There is a social pathology in our country; I mean, this love of something that goes 'bang' and throws a piece of lead is insane," Ekman said.

He questions what goes on in some gun enthusiasts' minds that makes possessing weapons so important to them, and it concerns him that insecure individuals purchase guns to make themselves feel more secure.

The pastor said he is rooting for a restrictive new gun law Colorado Democrats are trying to pass, but he thinks a federal gun control law would be a better solution.

"We've lived with this accelerating violence for so long we're unable, almost, to imagine what it would be like to live without that," Ekman said.

-- By Caitlin Morris

Robyn Ringler

Thirty-two years ago this month, Robyn Ringler of Ballston Lake was the assistant head nurse of a floor of George Washington Hospital when President Ronald Reagan was rushed to the hospital with a gunshot wound.

She was one of the nurses who cared for Reagan for 10 days during his recovery.

"I learned there is just no difference between taking care of a president and taking care of anyone else," Ringler said. She offered emotional support on top of her medical expertise and saw the president through his recovery.

Reagan was shot only a few months after she'd needed to offer emotional support to the patients of a popular cardiologist in her hospital who had been killed by a burglar with a gun.

"It raised the question: Why? Why does a criminal like that have a gun?" Ringler said.

Months later, she asked the same question about the mentally ill John Hinkley Jr., Reagan's would-be assassin.

The seed had been planted, but it took Ringler another 18 years before her feelings on gun control were galvanized by the shooting at Columbine High School. She watched a news broadcast in which the reporter compared Columbine's setup to that of Shenendehowa High School in Clifton Park.

"The parallels she drew between there and my children's high school really made it real to me," she said. "I thought, 'This is not acceptable,' and I vowed to do something."

For 14 years, Ringler, who also owns East Line Books in Clifton Park and writes a blog on The Saratogian's website, has been an outspoken activist for sensible gun legislation.

She is now the leader of the Capital District chapter of New Yorkers Against Gun Violence and a member of the national Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, named for its founder, James Brady, former Reagan press secretary who was shot in the attempt to assassinate the president.

Ringler was one of the speakers at the Albany rally of One Million Moms Against Guns that praised the SAFE Act for making New York's gun regulations some of the toughest in the nation.

"I think Andrew Cuomo and the New York legislators showed great courage in passing the act," she said, adding that she is not against guns in general but is against an "unfettered Second Amendment."

"The Second Amendment and how it is approached is a balancing act," Ringler said.

She believes arguments against the new gun restrictions "show a lack of empathy and compassion."

But while she supports the New York law, Ringler is working at the Brady Campaign to change federal laws, which she said are necessary to create cohesive national gun restrictions.